Each year thousands of students participate in marching bands. Many participate by carrying a flag, baton, woodwind or brass instrument, or a percussion instrument, i.e., drum. These musicians perform demanding and strenuous movements, and a particular group of musicians perform these movements while carrying large cumbersome loads. The drumline is of particular interest due to the unique and restricting nature of the instrument: a load carried anterior to the body with the only points of contact on the body at the shoulders and across the abdominal area. The influence of load carriage research on gait and joint mechanics, muscle activity, and contact pressure can be seen in the ever changing backpack designs and recommendations of load mass; however, there still remains a lack of research on marching band load carriage.
Many load carriage professions and recreational activities utilize a lumbar belt as part of the lift belt, hiking pack, or military rucksack to help dissipate the weight of the load between the shoulders, trunk, and pelvis. This background knowledge of the environments in which lumbar belts are already being used is what began the initial thought of how to utilize this load carriage tool for the marching band members, particularly since their load carriage situations are similar and yet so unique. The existing technology is fairly consistent across the industries: military, hiking, ergonomics. The belt is either form-fitting or stuffed with a small amount of padding, cut to lie in the small of the back. Some designs will wrap around the sides of the trunk and over the pelvic bones, but either the padding does not continue around the body or the connection of the belt is at the abdominal region which would interfere with the drum carrier's belly or abdominal plate. The general attachment techniques include using Velcro® to attach the two side pieces to each other, or using a buckle that will snap across the abdomen.
The predominate use of these lumbar belts is for loads that are being carried on the back part of the body. Thus, it can be seen that needs exist for improved marching drum stability and mobility support belt that allows for load distribution from loads placed on the front of the body.
At this time, however, it can be seen that the concept of using a belt that will connect to a drum carrier has been established prior to this invention's disclosure. The prior art utilizes a belt designed to attach via a buckle and/or Velcro® connectors to a drum carrier. Such a device has been disclosed in, for example, U.S. patent application Ser. No. 13/305,068 and U.S. Pat. No. 7,671,261.
Momose, however, did not teach the use of a belt for back support in U.S. Pat. No. 7,671,261, but, rather, only for the purpose of bringing the drum closer to the user's body via a fixed positioning and guiding path of the belt. However, there are still many differences between the prior art and the present invention, as the features of the present invention will become more fully apparent from the following description and appended claims, or may be learned by the practice of the invention as set forth hereinafter.